feeding

[seppalta]

Seth: We understand that we haven't familiarized ourselves with a
feeding regime that would promote top performance out of our dogs. Is
there a standard that you use with feeding? Do you feed certain meats
at certain times of the year? Do you keep track of calories, protein,
fat, etc.? Have you ever come across information on how many calories
a dog burns in a day, a day with running, distances, etc.?

Doug: I've done about every reasonable feeding routine at one time or
another. As long as extremes are avoided, the difference in
performance from different diets is always greatly outweighed by the
difference between having good dogs and having even better dogs.
These are my general rules:

(1) At least one-half (by weight) of the diet should be meat. If
you go more than half, then you should supplement with vitamins and
minerals that the meat doesn't contain. Of course, it doesn't hurt to
supplement at one-half or even less. Of special importance is the
addition of dicalcium phosphorus (bone meal) if the meat does not have
bone ground up in it. This is a muscle relaxer, very important in
distance racing. Both DC and vitamin-mineral supplements for beef can
be obtained from Tri-Ag out of Harvard, Illinois. See the link on the
seppalas.com link page. Whole ground chicken needs no supplements.

(2) Besides quality I have always let availability and cost
dictate my choice of dry dog food. Cost is not usually the best
indicater of value. Here I recommend experimenting in the period
between spring and fall. Try different brands and watch the stools.
The goal is to get minimum stool quantity with a consistent firmness.
Of course, cheaper foods will usually produce more stool. It will be
up to you to decide where the line is between adequate caloric intake
(greater stools means less calories) for your kind of racing and
cost. The ingredient list found on all dog food bags gives the
ingredients making up the food ordered by quantity from greatest to
least. The first ingredient should be always meat based, preferably
chicken. Next best is chicken meal. Stay away from anything with "by
products" in its name, for example "chicken by-products". Try to keep
"grains", corn, wheat, etc, low on the list. The protein- fat
percentages should be in the neighborhood of 30%-20%, or higher.

(3) Finally some source of fat should be used to control caloric
intake depending upon need. I use lard which I purchase from my local
little grocer. He special orders me 50 pound blocks for about $35. I
vary the quantity used by temperature and exposurer. Do not usually
feed any if the temperature is over freezing, or if the dogs are
living out of the truck and not being run. A cube, one to two inches
per side, is generally fed to each dog when fed. The actual size
depends upon my estimate of the individual dog's needs. Skinny and
smooth-coated dogs get more than fat and heavy coated dogs.

(4) I may reduce, but never completely cut-out, meat consumption and
may change to a lower quality, but still chicken based, dry food in
the summer. Dogs may take as long as 3 months to adapt to a radical
change in diet.

There are a nuber of articles about computing calories, etc. I've
never taken these too seriously. I prefer to base my feeding on the
appearance and energy level of the dogs. When you run your dogs every
day, you soon develop the ability to tell when they have energy and
when they don't. When they don't, you ask why. The answer is usually
connected to weather or health (sickness). However if the dogs over-
all look skinny, then you had better investigate your feeding program.

[Dotty Sanders]

Hi;
Just let me put my 2cents worth of advise into this.
You are looking for dog food that keeps the stool small, wonderful for you, but not the DOG!
Beet Pulp is added to the dogfood to make the stool small and it does shorten the dogs live. It causes all sorts of health problems.
Search the Internet for a consumer report on this issue. The article was published about 1990 or so and it was posted on my site for the longest.
I hope this  info helps.
Ladyhawk


> Date: Tue, 26 Feb 2008 23:22:53 -0800
> Subject: feeding
> From: sepp...@gmail.com
> To: Seppala...@googlegroups.com

[Christen Rose-Anderssen]

I think there is a major misunderstanding here.
Doug's advice is not about feeding the dogs commercial dog food that gives small
stools but to feed the dogs a diet that is natural for dogs. That means a diet
mainly based on meat (incedently the same applies to cats). You add some fat
during heavy training and races because fat is easily transformed into energy
like carbohydrates are for humans.
I used to have regular contact with Professor David S. Kronfeldt in the early
1980s, the expert on nuitrition of racing sled dogs. If I am not wrong, David's
recommendation also suggested not more than 4% carbohydrates in the feed during
racing season. You have to take the energy from fat which can be fast turned
into energy. However, the dogs need the protein from the meat, otherwise the
dog will start to metabolise on the dogs own mucles and you don't want that. I
think you also must remember Doug's advice to include bonemeal when you are
feeding the dogs pure muscle meat. If you feed the dog the whole animal you
are, however, safe.

Chris Rose-Anderssen

Quoting Dotty Sanders <ladyha...@hotmail.com>:

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Christen Rose-Anderssen
Research Associate
Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre with Boeing
Department of Mechanical Engineering
University of Sheffield
Mappin Street
Sheffield
S1 3JD
UK
Phone: (44) 01142227892